Strat-O Knows

Yesterday, I found myself playing the 1949 White Sox against the ’49 Pirates, two sixth-place teams locked in a Strat-O-Matic series.  The good guys, the American League, won in six.

 

I had 42-year old Luke Appling and his 121 walks batting third.  Let me repeat, 121 walks, and let me add, 24 (!!!) strikeouts in 619 plate appearances.  In a twenty-year career that began in 1930, Appling walked 1302 times while striking out 528 times.  By way of comparison, Yoan Moncada of the Sox has fanned 303 times in not even two full seasons.

 

Apples and oranges, past to present, never the two shall meet?  You can’t compare a Hall of Famer to a 23-year old work in progress?  Well, how about Eddie Joost, then?  He’s not in Cooperstown, in part because he was a career .239 hitter.  But guess what?  Joost walked 149 times in 1949, and he had a career .361 OBP over a seventeen seasons.

 

Or what about Eddie Yost, aptly nicknamed “The Walking Man”?  Yost only walked 91 times in 1949, but, hey, he was just 22.  The next season he managed141 free passes, and that wasn’t even a career best.  In 1956, Yost walked 151 times with the Senators.  In an eighteen-year career, Yost batted .254 while amassing a 394 OBP.  Twenty years, seventeen years, eighteen years—notice a pattern?

 

Ted Williams hit 43 homeruns (with 162 walks!) and Vern Stephens, his Red Sox teammate, chipped in with 39 long balls, so it’s not like we’re talking Dead Ball Era II here.  The whole approach to hitting was different, and in this case, superior to what it is today.  If there were more Eddie Joosts and Eddie Yosts around, let alone Luke Applings, you’d have a heck of a lot more scoring.

 

And people would realize baseball is about more than launch angles and exit velocity.